An Edmonton writing and travel blog featuring beer, food and literature. Follow me as I adventure the worlds of publishing, literature and travel as a "Big Time Writer."

Friday, October 24, 2008

A few years ago I had a blog and stopped it, promising never to blog again. That all changed when I got a two book deal with Forge Books, an mainstream/literary/mystery/thriller/western/non-fiction imprint of Tor books, which is itself an Sci-fi/Fantasy imprint of MacMillan US, a huge publishing conglomo that owns St. Martin's Press, Farrar Straus and Giroux, Henry Holt and Company, Faber and Faber, among others. And that's only the US. Furthermore, MacMillan is owned by an even larger German company, the Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Company, one of the world's largest media companies. So I've sold out completely to a major corporate titan and am very pleased with myself, despite my punk rock roots.

Anyway, I decided to write a blog about my adventures in this strange, big world and hopefully pass on information, advice and entertainment to writers, wanna-be writers, publishers, agents and anyone who's interested in this kind of crap. At the same time, it might add some promo for my upcoming books, although the publication date hasn't been determined yet Don't expect a daily update because despite this major label deal, I have to work as a freelance writer and have many, many deadlines. I'll try to get to this hopefully on a weekly basis.

First off, I must say that I am ecstatic to have this deal - it's been in the works for almost 2 years - but I'm not rich because of it. That's the first thing you should know. Just because you sign a deal with a major publisher, it doesn't mean you can quit your day job. IN fact, it's been almost a month since news came and I haven't seen a cent yet. There are contract details to work out and many steps to go through before any of that advance money comes in. And it will be only a percentage of the advance; you don't get it all at once you know.

1 comment:

I'm just now finding your blog b/c of a post about your debut novel, congrats, on the mystery by the book newsletter, so this is definitely something I'm curious about and looks like I have 2 years of catching up. LOL, I added your blog feed to my feedblitz account and look for to reading more of them and your book. Have a BLESSED year and congrats.

About Me

Wayne Arthurson is huge TAR (The Amazing Race) fan, having watched all the US, Asian and Australian versions of TAR. He's also a bestselling crime novelist and freelance writer. Plus, he plays drums in a band called Beerbelly.

Things I Like

I read 3-5 books/week and have been reading books since I was about 7. So to ask me to pick my favourite book(s) in the past 40 years is crazy.

I listen to a lot of music, play drums in an indie rock band and for a number of years in the 90s, played drums in a punk rock band. But my tastes in music is diverse from punk to classical, from jazz to alt-country and everything in between. I'm not a big fan of radio pop these days but when I was a kid, I was. So that's it about music.

I like to watch TV as well.

Are you starting to see a trend here about my likes?

And movies, I go to plenty of movies and watch them on TV or on my computer. Don't ask for my favourite.